Chelsea Flower Show is one of the most iconic events of the summer season. Famous for its stunning garden designs and gorgeous floral displays, it’s the perfect place to seek inspiration for your own outdoor set up. If you aren’t lucky enough to get there yourself between 24-28 May 2022, Good Homes guides you through some of the highlights of the Chelsea Flower Show gardens…

 

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1. Textile Garden for Fashion Revolution

Rethinking the link between our growing habits and our clothing, this innovative garden, designed by Lottie Delamain, considers how we use our resources to consider sustainable solutions.

Plants have played a key role in fashion throughout the decades, including dye as fibre and floral motifs. Today, most of our clothing is created using fossil fuels and toxic chemicals causing critical damage to health and the world’s eco systems.

The Textile Garden for Fashion Revolution aims to re-establish the link between plants and fashion, with planting in distinctive blocks of colour to resemble woven fabrics. Shallow pools represent dye baths, and paved seams lead through the planting.

2. Out of the Shadows

A lesson on how brilliant garden design can seamlessly incorporate modern lifestyle demands, Out of the Shadows by Kate Gould perfectly marries modern lifestyle with beautiful planting. As a small, contemporary garden, it features a state of the art Jacuzzi spa for exercising, spaces for seating and relaxation, climbing bars, and even a yoga/meditation space situated amongst exotic, tropical plants.

While combining functional pieces might seem at odds with the typical Chelsea Flower Show garden, Kate has cleverly recessed it within the gardens’ natural wood decking, and strategically placed perforated brickwork to let light and shadow break across the water. The combination of beautiful design and functionality extends across the garden, through carefully placed rock seats and a central fire pit, as well as shower and exercise areas.

Kate’s style has well and truly paid off, as she has claimed the crown for Best Sanctuary Garden and Best Construction in the Sanctuary Garden category and a Gold medal at the Chelsea Flower Show 2022.

3. Our Green Planet and RHS Bees Garden

BBC Earth and the RHS have teamed up to bring you this special garden, which aims to inspire people to grow bee-friendly plants and to demonstrate the importance of plants in protecting our precious pollinators.

Many types of British wild bees are in decline. The BBC Studios Our Green Planet and RHS Bee Garden, designed by Joe Swift, highlights the plight to stop some of the species being lost altogether. The silhouette of the bees wing is a crucial part of the design, which is also brimming with nectar and pollen-rich plants.

Discover which plants you can add to your garden to help the bees in your local area on the RHS website.

4. Brewin Dolphin Garden

Showcasing how a former 1900s industrial brownfield site can be transformed with sustainability at its heart, the Brewin Dolphin Garden reflects the challenges of inheriting poor soil conditions that many of these new homeowners will face.

Paul Hervey-Brookes’ Chelsea Flower Show gardens demonstrate how older plots can be rehabilitated to create an environmentally sustainable landscape. The emphasis is on repurposing and reusing existing materials found within sites, such as recycled aggregates, and plants which can actively restore polluted soil.

The plants include raspberry, pendulous sedge and angelica which all clean the air through higher rates of CO2 absorption.

5. Mandala, Meditation and Mindfulness Garden

Created as a post-pandemic escape garden, this safe haven is perfect for spending time sitting, relaxing and meditating. The tranquil water, humming bees and birds combine to make it a calm, restful and rejuvenating space.

The key element of this space, designed by Nikki Hollier, is the water feature against the backdrop of violet wall with a mandala, surrounded by stunning eucalyptus trees and white flowers. There are even herbs to pick and make tea. The Mandala, Meditation and Mindfulness Garden is the perfect place to switch off and enjoy a moment of zen within such a chaotic world.

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